A fellow who has given us half a dozen books on NoŽl Coward and edited his letters (he is, after all, a trustee of the NoŽl Coward Foundation), Barry Day here collects a broad and very fine sampling from the lyricist, playwright, poet, screenwriter, author, and wit known as the Master. Here are scenes from Coward's plays (The Vortex, Blithe Spirit, Private Lives, and Design for Living), screenplays (Brief Encounter and In Which We Serve), and from his only published novel Pomp and Circumstance, as well as four of his best short stories. Here too are the lyrics for gems like "Mad Dogs and Englishmen," "The Stately Homes of England," "Someday I'll Find You," and "Mad About the Boy."

"A wonderful selection of the Master's work, plays, fiction, songs, brilliant nuggets from an incredibly rich life's work that ought to be placed under the Christmas tree of anyone who admires Coward, or is interested in the theater, or has even the slightest curiosity about English life and letters from the end of the First World War to the end of the Second.... The best of his best work is gathered here, as fresh and readable as ever, in a volume that is full of wonderful things, and equally wonderful illustrations. Buy it, darling!"óMichael Korda